THE OPPOSITION

AFC Wimbledon are preparing for the new Sky Bet League One season, their sixth at that level. They finished 19th in the table last season, avoiding relegation by four points. They will kick-off their new campaign away to Doncaster Rovers at the start of August.

This will be Brentford's first visit to the rebuilt Plough Lane. AFC Wimbledon built their new stadium a short walk from the home of the former Wimbledon FC and moved in last November. The stadium is built on the site of the former Wimbledon greyhound track. The sides did meet in a pre-season game in 2019 and an EFL Cup tie in 2017. Both games were played at Kingsmeadow, in Kingston, where AFC Wimbledon played until last November and resulted in Brentford wins.

There are plenty of common ties between the two squads with Jaakko Oksanen, Mads Bech Sorensen, and Marcus Forss all spending time on loan with AFC in previous seasons while Aaron Pressley will join up with The Dons next week for a season-long stay in KT1.

Former Bees Academy goalkeeper Nik Tzanev is Wimbledon's current number one while Darius Charles, who came through the youth system in TW8 to play 42 times for us in the mid-2000s, re-joined AFC earlier this month.

TEAM NEWS

The Bees have been back in training for a week at Jersey Road but we are still missing our European Championship representatives; Christian Nørgaard, Mathias Jensen, Halil Dervişoğlu, Marcus Forss, and Pontus Jansson are all due back to training over the coming weeks.

THE MANAGER

Mark Robinson has done it all during his 17-year association with AFC Wimbledon. Since 2004, the UEFA A licence coach has served the Dons as Head of Youth, Centre of Excellence Manager, Academy Manager, Lead Professional Phase Coach and Loan Manager, First Team Coach, Interim Manager, and now Head Coach.

His 21 games in charge from January saw seven wins as AFC managed to pull clear of the League One relegation battle in the final weeks of the season.

THE KIT

The Bees will be wearing our new 2021/22 home shirt for the first time at Plough Lane tomorrow.

Priced at £49 for adults and £38 for juniors, this season’s kits will be available to purchase exclusively from the Bees Store on Braemar Road on Saturday 24 July (9am-6pm) and Sunday 25 July (10am-4pm). The kits will also be available from Monday 26 July on shop.brentfordfc.com – we will notify supporters when online sales are live. Fans will have the chance to customise their shirts with name and number personalisation and the Premier League sleeve badge.

LAST TIME OUT

MATCHDAY INFO

Tomorrow's game is open to AFC Wimbledon Season Ticket Holders only.

HOW TO FOLLOW

We will be providing a live stream on our YouTube channel so fans can enjoy our opening friendly ahead of the new Premier League campaign.